My Southern Food Journey - Part 2

Welcome back friends!

It looks like my boredom is turning into a pretty productive food journey, haha!

Today we journey to Alabama & Georgia for Fried Green Tomatoes. I literally made these fried green tomatoes, while watching the movie "Fried Green Tomatoes". Don't judge me.

I've heard people talk about fried green tomatoes before, but I've only ever had them once. It was about 7 years ago, when I was first starting to really branch out and try cooking new things. I didn't know a whole lot about how to make them, so I decided to wing it. Yeah, big mistake. First of all, my tomatoes weren't green enough, so when they hit the oil in the pan, they nearly disintegrated. Secondly, I didn't use corn meal, I just made a batter like my mom used to make for fried chicken. Needless to say, they were NOT good.

I found some green heirloom tomatoes at my local fresh market, and got really excited to try making these again. Since it had been so long since my first failed attempt, I was willing to give it another try, because I've come a looooooong way since then. And I figured that with my man being deployed, if they didn't turn out, then there would be no proof seeing as how I'd be the only one who would know (muahahahahaha!).

Mehgan's Fried Green Tomatoes

Ingredients:

-2 large green tomatoes, sliced about 1/4" thick

-2 eggs, beaten
-1/4 cup buttermilk
-1 cup of corn meal
-1/2 tsp garlic salt
-1/4 tsp pepper
-4 tbsp butter
-1/4 cup sour cream
-1 tbsp Frank's Red Hot sauce

Directions: Heat a medium frying pan over low-medium heat. In a bowl, combine the eggs & buttermilk. In a separate bowl, sift together the corn meal, garlic salt and pepper. Melt the butter in the pan, then dredge the tomatoes first in the egg/buttermilk mixture, then coat evenly with the corn meal mixture. Place in the frying pan. Cook until golden brown on both sides. While the tomatoes are cooking, mix the sour cream and Frank's Red Hot sauce in a prep bowl. Serve the tomatoes hot with the sour cream mixture to dip them in.

My thoughts: Scrumptious! I know they're terrible for you, but I just couldn't resist. And I had contemplated cooking them in vegetable or olive oil, but thought the butter would give them a nice flavor. The crunch from the corn meal really complimented the sweet tanginess of the tomatoes so well, that I could imagine myself consuming my own body weight in these and still want more. I'd be in pain, sure, but I'd also be completely satisfied.

What's really cool about this recipe is that it's not only simple, but it's also very versatile. You could change the spices in the corn meal mixture, to kick it up a notch. You can use these instead of lunch meat or hamburger patties on sandwiches.

I told my dear fiance that I'm so making these for him when he gets home. He's going to love them!

~Mehgan

Royal Foodie Joust-September 2007

Every month, Jenn from the Leftover Queen hosts The Royal Foodie Joust. Each contestant is given three ingredients they must use to create a recipe that is competition-worthy for the title of Royal Foodie Joust Winner. This month's Royal Foodie Joust ingredients are chipotle, zucchini and buttermilk, as chosen by August 1, 2007's winnder marye from Apron Strings and Simmering Things. I was a bit daunted by this challenge, there were so many possiblities, and I wanted my creation to be creative, different, and most of all, tasty!

I've never cooked with chipotle before, but after this challenge, I feel I'll be adding this to my cooking repertoire for Latin foods from now on. I loved the smoky flavor, with the nice lip-smacking bite it leaves in your mouth.

I decided to go with stuffed chicken breasts, seeing as how I've never tried stuffing chicken breasts before, but thought it would really bring out the zucchini flavors. So, without further ado, here's my recipe for Zucchini Stuffed Chicken Breasts with a Buttermilk Chipotle Sauce:

For the chicken:
-4 skinless chicken breasts, halved
-1 zucchini, sliced thin
-1/2 cup sliced cheddar
-salt and pepper
-toothpicks to hold the breast together, should you need it

For the sauce:
-1 eight oz can of chipotle chiles in adobo sauce
-1/2 cup buttermilk
-4 oz. plain yogurt
-salt and pepper

Instructions: Preheat oven to 375F. In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the ingredients for the sauce. I added about a half tablespoon of lime juice, but you can opt out of that, I'm just a freak about lime. Line a 13" x 9" pan with tin foil. Cut a slit in the center of each chicken breast half and stuff it with your desired amount of cheese and zucchini (I layered mine so I had two pieces each of the zucchini and cheese). I had some extra zucchini leftover, and knew I'd be using toothpicks to hold them together while they cooked, so I topped each breast half with a slice of zucchini and stuck the toothpick through that. Continue until each breast half is complete and place them in the lined pan. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the breasts are cooked through. Once they're done, pour the chipotle sauce over them.

I thought these turned out really, really well. The chipotle was far too spicy for me, so I ended up scraping the actual pepper pieces off, but kept the red sauce. My husband LOVED them, he's the king of all things spicy-hot. He even said to me, "Look how much you made me sweat... that's a good thing!" My little brother loved how they looked when they were plated, but was not a fan of the chipotle (spicy foods upset his stomach), but he was more than happy with the chicken without the sauce. I was especially happy that these made enough for me to bring for dinner tomorrow night when I stand duty.

I'll be posting the link for you to vote for yours truly after September 1st, which is when voting is available. I hope I get your vote! Thanks!

~Mehgan~